Sunday, November 23, 2014

I'm Thankful For...Church

I love my church. I have kind of a weird story on how I found it. After graduation, I moved home and started looking for a church to plug into full-time (my family had moved to this city while I was in college and are not Christians so they had not already looked at options on my behalf.) I merely googled church and my zip code; it was the first one that came up. I looked at its website and was pleased that they had a statement about what they stood for. I looked at a few other churches and they did not have such words. It seemed close (it is, less than 15 minutes which is good for days when you're lazy; it is hard for me to tell myself that I can't go when it's so close.) It seemed big, which I wanted so I could meet more people in this relatively new to me area. And once I got there, I decided it had an excellent parking lot so I was sold (oh and I liked the preaching too-I guess that's kind of important.)

D and P are my church ladies. D mentored both P and me as ladies who don't have family who are churchgoers/believers and we know that we can sit together and have that vital community.

S - is my Bible Study leader. We met at a Women's Night when she told me that Tuesday night was Bible Study night for the rest of my life. Do you understand how scary that is? To have someone you just met tell you that you're going to be spending that much time together? I thought, "Let's get through the fall session first." But by the time it was done, I realized that as long as I live here, Tuesday night *is* Bible Study night. She's also just a complete sweetheart and invests so much in us young ladies. I'm so grateful to know her.

C and A are young ladies from my Bible Study. A moved east and I've been missing her so much while C seems so familiar to me that I keep asking her, "remember when?" and she says she wasn't there for that.

My Bible Study ladies are really all fabulous ladies. This session had a good group of faithful young women who were vulnerable and eager to pray and follow the Lord. I hope they continue in the winter so we can continue to get to know and support each other.

Pastor M. - there are several pastors but M is the lead one and he is such an intellectual, delving deep into the Word but also free with relatable stories that make things seem more clear. He's also a really cool relaxed surfer dude (totally California) and a devoted husband and father.